Headline, October 24 2021/ ''' '' LONDON -TECHNOLOGY- LOCKON '' '''

''' '' LONDON -TECHNOLOGY-

 LOCKON '' '''

THE U.K. CAPITAL HAS FOR CENTURIES been a center of global finance, with long-established trading exchanges and trusted banking and insurance institutions.

In the digital era, it has become an emerging hub for fintech companies, which use technology to improve financial services. Not even the uncertainty presented by U.K.'s departure from the European Union in early 2020, coupled with the disruption of the global pandemic, has stemmed growth.

Venture-capital firms invested $4.57 billion in U.K-based fintech companies last year, making the country second only to the U.S., where investment was $19.6 billion, according to growth platform Tech Nation's annual report on the U.K. tech sector.

WHEN SILICON VALLEY VETERAN EILEEN BURBIDGE moved to London in 2004 - it was only meant to be temporary. With more than a decade of experience at tech stalwarts including Apple, Sun Microsystems and Verizon Wireless -

The Chicago native felt a stint in Europe might help advance her career back in the U.S. With no language barrier and an emerging-software development market, London was an obvious choice. She took on a job as product director for a newly launched startup named Skype.

Nearly 20 years later, Burbidge is still there. Now co-founder and partner of early-stage venture-capital  firm Passion Capital, she has established herself as an intrinsic part of London's financial technology, or ''fintech,'' scene.

Burbidge was the digital representative on former Prime Minister David Cameron's business advisory panel and was honored by Queen Elizabeth II in 2015 as a member of the Order of the British Empire -or MBE - for services to U.K. business. She also served as tech ambassador for the office of mayor of London, and is now a fintech envoy to the U.K. Treasury.

It's a little surprise then that Burbidge sees London firmly as the beating heart of the tech-forward financial world.''

It's got the unique combination of financial services heritage, with 300 of the world's banking headquarters based here, plus progressive policymakers who support fintech innovation,'' she tells TIME over a video call from her home office in North London.

! WORTH REPEATING HONORS ! : The U.K. capital has for centuries been a center of global finance. with long- established trading exchanges and trusted banking and insurance institutions.

In the digital era, it has become an emerging hub for fintech companies, which use technology to improve financial services.

Not even the uncertainty presented by the U.K's departure from the European Union in early 2020, coupled with the disruption of the global pandemic, has stemmed growth.

Venture - capital firms invested $4.57 billion in U.K. fintech companies last year, making the country second only to the U.S., where investment was $19.6 billion, according to growth platform Tech Nation's annual report on the U.K. tech sector.

And in the first half of 2021 alone, U.K. tech companies raised more than $18 billion worth of venture-capital funding, according to figures compiled for the U.K.'s Digital Economy Council.

''Investors showing their confidence in London's fintech offering reinforces our city's position as a leading global hub for this important and growing industry,'' Sadiq Khan, the mayor of London, says in a statement.

''Despite the impact of Brexit and the pandemic, we've seen record levels of funding for fintech businesses in the first six months of the year.''

The success story of this boom in fintech innovation has undoubtedly been so-called challenger banks    -digital-only banking apps that use cloud-based infrastructure, embedded artificial intelligence, agile frameworks to give consumers easier and faster access on banking services and financial products.

Companies like Revolut, Starling  Bank and Monzo have raised increasingly large sums of money and established themselves as household names among their tech-savvy, large millennial and Gen Z consumer base, many of whom have eschewed traditional retail banking in favor of these more user-friendly banking apps.

How London evolved to become a challenger to established hubs for innovation in the U.S. has lessons for entrepreneurs and investors who find an increasingly difficult regulatory environment and a shrinking talent pool for development in California., New York or Texas.

Burbidge, one of the key architects of the fintech boom, sees a changing of the guard. ''Before long my colleagues in the U.S. stopped asking when I was coming back and by 2016 were instead coming across to join me,'' she says.

WHEN BURBIDGE SET ABOUT building her team at Skype in 2004, the lack of qualified workers was one of the biggest challenges she faced. ''Despite this burgeoning tech and digital sector in London, it was impossible for me to find a product manager, and the first few hires I made all came from the States.''

Now, she says there is a ''wide concentration of developers, so much more than San Jose or New York.''

The Honor and Serving of the Latest Global Operational Research on Technology, Global Hubs and the Future, continues. The World Students Society thanks author Gina Clarke.

With respectful dedication to Leaders, Students, Professors and Teachers of U.K., and then the world. See Ya all prepare and register for Great Global Elections on The World Students Society - the exclusive ownership of every student in the world : wssciw.blogspot.com and Twitter - !E-WOW! - The Ecosystem 2011 : 

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